


self-loathing before you awoke me

by lucymonster



Category: Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Dangerous morally grey person utterly loyal to person they see as good and kind, M/M, Morally Ambiguous Character, Redeemed Ben Solo, War
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-28
Updated: 2021-01-28
Packaged: 2021-03-12 12:34:54
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,558
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29010627
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lucymonster/pseuds/lucymonster
Summary: Kylo Ren defects from the First Order at the Battle of Takodana. One year on, Finn leads the ground forces of a much stronger Resistance, helped by his most trusted and least trustworthy lieutenant.
Relationships: Finn/Ben Solo | Kylo Ren
Comments: 2
Kudos: 12
Collections: Bulletproof 20/21





	self-loathing before you awoke me

**Author's Note:**

  * For [jirin](https://archiveofourown.org/users/jirin/gifts).



By the time the sun sets over the west ridge of the Forbidden Valley, Finn wants nothing more than to collapse on his bedroll. He doesn't get that luxury. Not yet.

Through dogged persistence from dawn till dusk, his troops have managed to turn the dust bowl into a more or less defensible outpost. The location is a compromise: Finn would rather be further north in one of the canyons with more cover, or else higher up with clear sight lines on the surrounding desert. Down here is the worst of both worlds. But it’s where Rey wants to be, and Rey is the only reason they’re on Pasaana to begin with. There’s important Jedi business buried in the swirling sands. Finn’s job is to keep the area secure while she digs for it. If his luck fails to hold, which it usually does, that will soon mean firing on First Order assault squads from shallow trenches while praying Poe’s airborne forces can stop the trough from turning into a shooting gallery for enemy TIEs.

For now, with no more tents to pitch or troops to rally, it means going another round with Ben on the eternally contentious issue of his field conduct.

‘The north road’s secure,’ Ben reports when Finn finds him under the camo-netted eaves of the command post. ‘I’ve got gun pits on either side of the mouth and batteries staggered all the way up the ridge.’

‘So I’ve heard,’ says Finn. ‘You’ve been taking over people’s homes.’

‘Yeah.’ The statement doesn’t even seem to register as a reproach on Ben’s radar. ‘The structures are mostly compact sand – they won’t hold up long under fire, but they’re decent camouflage, and much faster than trying to build our own. With the range on our new cannons, no one should get close enough to–’

‘Ben,’ says Finn. ‘You went in with blasters and threw civilians out of their homes. What the hell were you thinking?’

Ben stops. Blinks at Finn. He’s traded his usual black-on-black for the same desert fatigues as the rest of the troops, and sweat from the hard day’s labour has baked grit onto his mole-flecked face. He looks as tired and fed up as Finn feels. Finn gave him the north position because it’s the hardest, most hostile terrain in the valley. Outside of the summer festival season, the whole place is an empty wasteland, plagued by brutal sandstorms and beset by wind tunnels from the nearby canyons. A handful of hardy locals cluster in the relatively sheltered south – safe, or so Finn thought, from Ben’s creative understanding of noncombatant rights. ‘I was thinking,’ Ben says, voice taut with poorly concealed annoyance, ‘that the structures would make good camouflage. The civs had to evacuate anyway. It was win-win.’ He sighs, and rakes tousled dark hair out of his face. ‘You’re going to get on my case about it, aren’t you?’

‘Damn right I am. This could have been a big PR win for the Resistance: come in respectfully, warn the locals that the enemy’s coming, earn their gratitude by helping them evacuate. Instead, I take my eyes off you for five damn minutes and you start throwing innocent people out of their homes at blasterpoint with nothing but the clothes on their backs.’

‘So what? I knew someone else would pick them up and take them to the evac centre.’

Someone else meaning Finn. ‘You know what, I’m starting to get pretty damn sick of your attitude. You’re not with the First Order any more, Ben. This is the Resistance. We’re for the people. We _care_ about civilians.’

‘I don’t.’

It’s not like he’s ever made a secret of it. One short year that feels like a lifetime ago, Ben was Kylo Ren, the First Order’s most dreaded enforcer, and Finn was stormtrooper FN-2187, raised from birth to do one thing only. Finn defected to the Resistance the very first chance he got. Kylo Ren followed shortly after, claiming so unconvincingly to have seen the light that at first everyone was sure he was there as a spy on his dark master’s orders. But they both proved their loyalty. Finn rose through the ranks of the Resistance ground forces, and again Ben followed him, a brutally effective attack dog tearing chunks out of every First Order force they pointed him at. To this day none of the other generals understand why he does it. He has shown no sign of renouncing his old ideology or of wanting to change his violent ways. He still scorns the galactic democracy he’s fighting to protect. Still treats sentient lives like rocks to be kicked out of his path.

But again and again, he’s given a job and he gets it done. Strategically, he’s worth more than the rest of Finn’s officers put together. Finn is the only one who knows his real motive.

They’re alone in the command post, so he steps into Ben’s space, close enough to smell the sweat and dust on his skin. He’s shorter than Ben, but he never feels shorter, not when he draws himself up to his full height and sees Ben shrink in on himself like he wants to get small enough to tuck his head under Finn’s chin and hide there. It’s amazing how fast his bravado crumbles under physical proximity. It’s part of why, no matter how thankless the task of managing him can feel at times, Finn never really gets tired of it. He’s the only person who gets to see Ben like this, see the vulnerable truth inside the hardened shell. 

Ben doesn’t care about civilians or the cause. He doesn’t know _how_ to care. He’s too busy drowning, like he’s been drowning his whole life, and he follows Finn because Finn’s the life-buoy that keeps him afloat. _Because you defected first,_ Ben has confessed in the dark, breath hot on Finn’s neck, voice quiet and tremulous with awe. _You were brainwashed to do nothing but kill, and you brushed off that whole lifetime’s training as if it was nothing. No one ever taught you to love. It’s just who you are._

Alone in the tent, Finn kisses Ben, rough and angry, with teeth on Ben’s plump lower lip and a tight hand fisted in his hair. When he pulls back, Ben’s pupils are wide and his breathing has quickened. ‘I’m not having this argument again,’ Finn says. ‘You know the rules you're supposed to follow, and you’re capable of following them with or without my supervision. Now get the hell back out there and fix your mess.’

Defiance and disappointment show clear on Ben’s face. ‘What mess? The work’s done, and thanks to you everyone’s already been evacuated.’

‘And you’ve set their empty homes up to be used for enemy target practice. I want you to migrate your whole defence as far away from the settlement as possible. You can dig your own damn artillery pits, and then maybe if we’re lucky the First Order will blow up those instead. And when you’re done–’ He raises his voice over Ben’s impending objection – ‘you can come back here and we’ll pick this back up.’

For a moment, Ben seems to be trying to decide if the order is a bluff. On the eve of almost certain battle, depriving his best lieutenant of precious recovery time is not a choice Finn takes lightly. But there are things more important than his own longing to drag Ben to bed and forget about the war for a few short hours. He never bluffs with Ben. After a pause Ben remembers it, and his scowl turns mutinous. 'No, we won't. It’ll take all night to move positions.’

‘Maybe you should have thought of that before cutting corners on other people's basic rights. If you'd done it properly in the first place, you could have spent the night with me instead of out there digging pits in the dark.'

Ben’s confession has a second half to it, so deeply felt and vulnerable that he’s never managed to say it aloud. But Finn hears it anyway: _If you’re so good at love, maybe – just maybe – you can even love me._ That, not frustrated lust and certainly not loyalty to the cause, is why Ben always folds in the end. Finn holds his furious gaze until he drops it, cowed. 

‘Sorry,’ Ben mumbles.

‘Don’t be sorry. Be digging.’ He softens his own expression and plants another kiss on Ben’s lips, brisk and promising. ‘I won’t wait up. But if you finish early, you can wake me.’

He feels a little bad for the soldiers under Ben who just had their workload doubled for the simple crime of following bad orders. But Finn can only tackle one problem at a time. Ben doesn’t care about civilians or the cause. He only cares about the answer to his unasked question, the answer Finn tries every day to make him understand: _Of course I can love you. The sooner you stop testing me on it, the easier it’ll be for both of us._ Maybe one day, once that issue is laid to rest, Ben will even find room in his heart to care about other things as well. Finn lives in hope.

Until that day, he’ll just keep on playing Ben’s game. He always wins.


End file.
